UPDATED WITH INTERVIEWS AT 2:47 P.M.
Half Price Books senior vice president Kathy Thomas said the retailer wanted to move into about half of the former Barnes & Noble space on MacArthur, but couldn’t come to terms with the landlord AmReit.

There was a spike in sales after the two Barnes & Noble stores closed, but not enough to make a big difference, Thomas said. The demographics aren’t there for book sellers, she said.

Overall, business is still good for the Dallas-based chain of 117 stores. It opened a store in Chicago last week and has plans to open another Austin store in July. Stores in Seattle and Kansas City will be relocated this summer. About 20 percent of its leases come due every year, Thomas said.

Tom Thumb is closing its Skillman and Abrams store in Lake Highlands early this summer. The store must be doing poorly because it also housed the Tom Thumb general office.

Spokeswoman Connie Yates said the new location for the Tom Thumb division staff hasn’t been announced yet.
The store originally opened as Simon David and in the 1990’s was later changed to Tom Thumb.

Yates said the Tom Thumb store nearby at Skillman and Audelia is being remodeled. It’s getting a Starbucks with Wi-Fi.

The floral department is being expanded. The organic selection in produce will be expanded. Bakery will also be bigger and more hot and fresh menu items will be added to the food service department.
New floors and LED lighting is also being installed.

There’s definitely more food competition nearby not only from the SuperTarget across the street, but also from the Wal-Mart Supercenter at Timber Creek Crossing on Skillman.

David Smith is retiring and sold his Pockets Menswear lease in Highland Park Village to Zegna.

Pockets Menswear owner David Smith is retiring after almost 40 years in business and sold his lease in Highland Park Village to his main supplier, Italian brand Ermenegildo Zegna.

Smith, 65, whose tag line is “Dress better than you have to,” said he plans to close his store by May 25. The store has been the place to shop for many Dallas CEOs and sports legends including Troy Aikman and Terry Bradshaw.

Zegna, which Pockets Menswear has been selling for more than 30 years, will open in November. Smith has agreed to work in the store three days a week during a six month transition.

Smith said Zegna called him and said they were interested in opening their own branded store in the Dallas market.

“But they said they wanted to talk to me first and really liked my spot. They’ve been great to me all these years,” Smith said. “They asked me what’s the number I need to exit my lease early.”

“It’s the right time for me to retire,” he said. Smith plans to visit his two adult children, who live in Austin and Peru, and his eight grandchildren. “My wife died about a year and a half ago and I really want to get to know my grandchildren.”

Smith and his late wife Margaret started the store in 1974 with $14,000 borrowed from his father.

That first location was a 500-square-foot shop next to a barber shop. It was in the Willow Creek apartments that were torn down several years ago at the northwest corner of N. Central Expressway and Walnut Hill Lane.

“Some of our first customers from the barber shop location are still shopping with us,” Smith said. Business has been good since the recession. “Ironically, 2012 was our second biggest year, after 2007.”

Neighborhoods in Frisco around Phillips Creek Ranch are buzzing about a new grocery store that the planned development is trying to attract.

Philips Creek Ranch said it can’t divulge the name of the company yet, but San Antonio-based H-E-B confirmed that it is doing “due diligence” on the site at the northeast corner FM 423 and Lebanon.

The developer, Republic Property Group, has invited area residents to a meeting on March 13 at 6 p.m. to talk about overall plans.

Making the claim that “west Frisco is hot,” the invitation said, “Since we opened our doors in January we have already had over 1,000 visitors come to Phillips Creek Ranch to visit the model homes and the information center.”

Here’s what H-E-B spokeswoman Leslie Sweet said in an emailed response: “H-E-B is always looking for new opportunities to serve more customers across Texas, and this includes the DFW market. However, there are no current plans for a market entry for H-E-B. We have been watching the DFW market for the last 15 years, and our interest remains to this day. As we review our long-term planning options, it often makes sense to purchase property in advance of H-E-B’s current real estate needs.”

That underlining is Sweet’s. And the due diligence is for an H-E-B store, not a Central Market, a chain it also owns.

So far, H-E-B has chosen to expand here with its foodie-centric Central Market stores. It opened its fifth Central Market in North Texas last year in Dallas. The company has been circling the area for several years with its conventional H-E-B supermarkets in Waxahachie, Cleburne and Burleson.

But the chain’s site selections are getting more urban.

H-E-B bought an 18-acre site inside Dallas County at Lake Ridge Parkway and Camp Wisdom Road in Grand Prairie and another parcel in Fort Worth at Boat Club and Bailey Boswell roads.

UPDATED WITH CLARIFICATION FROM J.C. Penney 2:03 p.m.
I have a clarification from J.C. Penney: The layoffs we reported Wednesday including the employees notified on Thursday. It’s the same action. Some people were told on Wednesday and others on Thursday.
The number is also significantly below the 300 that some have reported. See below, there were 85 people laid off.

ORIGINAL BLOG POST from 9:56 a.m.
There were more layoffs at J.C. Penney’s headquarters in Plano on Thursday.

J.C. Penney confirmed on Wednesday that there had been some staff cuts, but a spokesman wouldn’t give out numbers. He also didn’t put a time frame on the layoffs. Penney’s corporate office on Legacy Drive employs 3,000 people.

Current and former employees said the Wednesday group included 70 designers who work on private label Penney brands like Arizona and 15 people in IT.

J.C. Penney Co. spokesman Joe Thomas said the “minimal” number of staff cuts were in “multiple departments” and were part of a “slight shift in the home office organization” as Penney starts the second year of its transformation.

The cuts are a result of “streamlined operations and reduced work that is no longer necessary moving forward,” Thomas said.

Penney has turned over much of its IT operations to Oracle and cut back on the number of private labels that it makes as it shifts merchandise to more national and designer brands.

Earlier this month when asked about the prospect of staff cuts again this year, Penney CEO Ron Johnson seemed to leave a window open in his answer.

J.C. Penney Co. spokesman Joe Thomas confirmed that there have been some staff cuts at the Plano home office. He hasn’t supplied a number of people who were “recently” let go. I believe that was today.

Here’s the emailed response I just received from Thomas.

“As jcpenney enters its second year of transformation, we’re continuing to learn and adapt, making changes as business requires. We recently made a slight shift in the home office organization.”

That resulted in “minimal team member reductions across multiple departments.”

“By doing so, we have further streamlined operations and reduced work that is no longer necessary moving forward.”

A couple of weeks ago, Blockbuster’s parent company Dish Network said it’s closing another 300 stores. Most are closing in April and May. When Dish acquired Blockbuster out of bankruptcy in 2011, it took over about 1,700 stores. (At one time, Blockbuster about 5,000 U.S. stores.) Dish closed several hundred stores last spring.

“We continue to see value in the Blockbuster brand and we will continue to analyze store level profitability and – as we have in the past – close unprofitable stores,” said a Dish spokesman.

After this round of closings there will be about 500 Blockbuster stores in the U.S., he said.
Here’s the Texas list of Blockbuster stores that are scheduled to close.

Whole Foods Market has plans to open a store in Colleyville in early-to-mid 2014.

The Austin-based natural and organic grocer is taking over a 40,000-square-foot building that used to house an Albertsons. It’s located at 4801 Colleyville Blvd. at the southeast corner of Glade Road and Highway 26.

Whole Foods is part of a redevelopment of the Village Park Shopping Center, said Whole Foods Southwest president Mark Dixon. The 190,664-square-foot shopping center is being renovated by owner Centennial Real Estate Co. Plans include a prominent storefront and entrance for While Foods, Centennial said.

Whole Foods has been aggressive in this market. In November it said it’s planning a store in Uptown Dallas on McKinney Avenue between Fairmount and Routh streets. That store is scheduled for 2015.

In 2010, it opened stores in the Shops at Park Lane in Dallas and the Village at Fairview near Allen.

Now it operates eight stores in North Texas, including one moving soon from Richardson to Addison’s Village on the Parkway. A Fort Worth store is in the works, and Whole Foods says it will open a new store in Highland Village near Flower Mound in 2014.

Whole Foods stock was lower in after-market trading. The company reported fiscal first quarter results that exceeded expectations by a penny, but it offered a full-year forecast that was slightly below what analysts expected.

UPDATED 7:15 a.m.
Tory Burch picked Fossil to make her “timepieces collection.” The fast-growing brand is a big win for Fossil which makes watches under other luxury names that it owns and licenses including Michele and Burberry. The Tory Burch launch is scheduled for holiday 2014.

Earlier post:
Fossil Inc. posted a 28 percent profit increase during the holiday quarter as the fashion accessories maker recorded its third consecutive year of double-digit gains in watch sales.

Shares were trading higher in the pre-market.

The Richardson-based company reported Tuesday a profit of $151.1 million, or $2.51 a share, in the quarter ended Dec. 29, compared with a profit of $117.9 million, or $1.87 a share in the prior year.

Total fourth-quarter sales increased 14 percent to $948 million from $830.8 million. Analysts surveyed by Thomson Reuters had forecast a profit of $2.26 a share and sales of $930.4 million.

CEO Kosta Kartsotis said sales gains were recorded in all its major geographic regions resulting in the global brand’s 19th consecutive quarter of comparable store sales gains. Asia, where Fossil has been making major investments, was particularly strong during the year, he said.

Fossil’s watches, handbags, jewelry, leather accessories, belts, sunglasses, shoes and clothing are sold in department stores and specialty stores in the U.S. and 130 countries. It also sells its merchandise in more than 400 of its own stores and online.

Dallas-based Belo Corp., which owns and operates 20 television stations, on Friday reported higher net profits and revenue for the fourth quarter and full year 2012 due to record political advertising revenue and stronger automotive ads.

The company’s profit rose 15.3 percent to $35.1 million, or 34 cents per share, in the quarter from $30.5 million, or 29 cents per share, a year earlier. Belo paid a special dividend of 25 cents in the quarter. Quarterly revenue rose 13.6 percent to $204.9 million.

Full year 2012 net profits rose 73 percent to $100.2 million, or 95 cents per share, from $58 million, or 55 cents per share, in 2011. Revenue rose about 10 percent to $714.7 million.

Belo chief executive Dunia A. Shive said in a statement that political revenue totaled $61.2 million, surpassing $60 million for the first time in the company’s history, and automotive ad revenue rose 16 percent in 2012.

For the current quarter, Shive expects total revenue to increase 2 percent to 2.5 percent, but combined station and corporate operating costs are expected to rise 3.5 percent to 4 percent from the first quarter of 2012.